The aim of this case study is to describe and analyse the process of a deaf girl's bilingual bimodal acquisitions from the age of 10 to 81 months of age. The first language acquired from birth was Swedish Sign Language in visual-gestural modality and from the age of three years with a cochlear implant (ci) also spoken Swedish in aural-vocal modality. This is viewed from the socio-(bi-)cultural constructive theory.

Methodology/research design

The main participant, here called Diana, grew up in a signing family, as both parents were deaf as well as an older sibling, though her twin was hearing. She attended pre-school and school for deaf children where she got education mainly through Swedish Sign Language. Diana was video-observed in her home during five years in sessions of one hour. Usually the sessions consisted of three activities: story-, play- and mealtime. Focus in this study is based on data of story time from 18 sessions of Diana interacting in joint attention with members in her family. Prior to ci Diana communicated through Swedish Sign Language.

Data was collected through transcribedvideo-observations, brief field notes, record assessments from the speech therapist in the ci-team and an interview with the child's deaf parents. In the first analysis step the single case study methodology was used. Where data of joint attention is exploratory analyzed in-depth and details are described (Creswell, 2007). In the second step data and results of the first step analysis were compared to studies within the field. The records and interviews validate the trustworthiness of the analysis. The specific research question to be addressed at this occasion is: within a frame of joint attention what characterises the interaction process of acquiring sequential bimodal bilingualism in a young deaf child with ci?

Expected findings

Through this unique single case study findings can illuminate as to how sequential language acquisition is developed and elucidate the parental mediation. The content of the processes should have implications for pedagogical professions especially in habilitation and preschool contexts. The preliminary results show a rapid progression in the second language despite limited exposure to it and being in a different modality.

The aim of this case study is to, within a socio-historical (Vygotsky, 1934) frame, describe and analyse the process of a parallel bimodal bilingual acquisition. A hearing Child Of Deaf Adults (CODA) interchanging with deaf family members were followed longitudinally. The languages acquired from birth were Swedish Sign Language in visual-gestural modality and spoken Swedish in aural-vocal modality.

Methodology/research design

The main participant, here called Hugo, grew up in a signing family, as an older sibling and his twin sister as well as both parents were deaf. He attended local pre-school where he communicated in spoken Swedish. Hugo was from the age of 10 to 40 months video-observed in his home in sessions of one hour. Usually the sessions consisted of three activities: story-, play- and mealtime. Focus in this study is based on data from story- and play-time from 12 sessions. Interaction consists of episodes in joint attention and of Hugo’s private speech (Bodrova & Leong, 2003).

Data was collected through video-observations, brief field notes and an interview with the child's deaf parents. In order to find patterns of critical changes in the data two types of analyses were conducted. The first inductively exploring started already at the transcriptional work in that possible moments of critical changes were noted and compared between participants. Interchanging episodes were in-depth analyzed (Creswell, 2007) and in-detail described (Yin, 2009). In the second step data and results of the first step analysis were abductively compared to studies within the field. The fieldnotes and interviews validate the trustworthiness of the analysis.

The specific research questions to be addressed at this occasion are what characterises the process of acquiring and mediating parallel bimodal bilingualism of a young CODA.

Expected findings

Through this single case study findings can illuminate how parallel language acquisition is developed and elucidate the parental bimodal and bilingual mediation. The content of the processes should have implications for pedagogical professions especially in information to educational contexts and bilingualism. The preliminary results show scaffolding bilingual acquisition, unlike previous studies, by single simultaneous bimodal insertions.

This case study longitudinally analyzes and describes the changes of attentional expressions in interchanges between a pair of fraternal twins, 1 deaf and 1 hearing, from the age of 10–40 months, and their Deaf family members. The video-observed attentional expressions of initiating and reestablishing interchange were grouped in 5 functional categories: “getting,” “directing,” “maintaining,” “redirecting,” and “checking” attention. Changes appear to be associated with development during the twins’ ages of 10–13, 15–24, and 28–40 months, including the use of vision in communication. Although there are similarities in the changes of each twin's communicative initiations, there are also differences based on hearing status, personality, and use of modality. This is evident in the ways in which each twin's individual attention interchanges unfold over time; it is also connected with the parents' negotiating attention and arranging “seating positions” with them. Implications and findings for special educational purposes are discussed.

This qualitative, longitudinal, single-case study aims to explore and describe naturalistic interactions between Deaf family members mediating their deaf twin acquiring Swedish Sign Language. The family was video-observed on 12 occasions from the child’s age of 10 months to 40 months. The participants’ actions and language structure are analyzed.

The results are presented in three age related segments transformations comprising actions in interactional style, gaze and structure of utterances. The first segment, from the child’s age of 10 to 13 months, includes primarily one-sign utterance with steady eye-contact or focus on an object with mediating, displaced signing as if the signing is from the child’s perspective. The second segment, from 15 to 24 months, includes altering, flexible gaze-contact, multi-phrases and narrative structure. The third segment includes conversations in dynamic visual-contact utilizing non-manual structure. Mediating factors like gaze, what-question and narrative, which could be useful for pedagogical purposes, are discussed.

The aim of this longitudinal case study was to describe bimodal and bilingual acquisition in a hearing child, Hugo, and in what ways these were guided by his Deaf family. Video observations of the family interactions were conducted from Hugo’s age of 10 months until he was 40 months old. The family language was Swedish Sign Language (SSL). With Hugo, however, the parents used one language base in which single gestural signs or vocal words were often simultaneously inserted, the latter when not in visual contact. Hugo showed awareness of visual attention to SSL communication at 22 months and differentiated vocal and gestural modality according to his partner two months later. During the 28-month and 32-month sessions, a grammatical analytic phase might explain why Hugo’s SSL was rare. Findings are possibly vital for a broader international audience than professionals who meet bimodal bilingual children.

Most deaf children are born to hearing families. During the last twenty years deaf children, in increasing numbers and at an early age, get cochlear implant (CI), a high-technologic hearing aid device. The aim of this qualitative, longitudinal, single-case study was to explore and describe critical changes in naturalistic, video-observed interactions between deaf family members.

In this study a deaf girl, Diana, from birth acquired Swedish Sign Language and received at the age of 35 months a unilateral cochlear implant (CI). Diana eventually developed spoken Swedish as a second language in vocal-aural modality. The study is triangulated with information from the CI-team records spanning the ages 31 months to 8 years. The latter age relates to the time when Diana’s receptive skill of vocal mode was assessed to be 7 years and 11 months. Mediating parameters include the parents’ positive attitude towards meaning-making interactions and encouragement of the child’s own bimodal activity. Diana’s hearing twin brother’s challenging her vocal modality and Diana’s bimodal production seemed to self-scaffold her second language acquisition. Further, her bimodality also scaffolded her family to perceive thus understand her utterances; in addition the other participants’ bimodal interchanges scaffolded her perception. The continued education in sign language seemed to be an asset as Diana could continue her social and intellectual development at the same time as she was acquiring a second language. Reported aspects of mediated actions might also influence a broader field of special needs.

This dissertation based on a case study explores the acquisition and the guidance of Swedish Sign Language and spoken Swedish over a span of seven years. Interactions between a pair of fraternal twins, one deaf and one hearing, and their Deaf[1] family were video-observed within the home setting.

The thesis consists of a frame which provides an overview of the relationship between four studies. These describe and analyze mainly storytime sessions over time. The first article addresses attentional expressions between the participants; the second article studies the mediation of the deaf twin’s first language acquisition; the third article analyses the hearing twins acquisition of parallel bimodal bilingualism; the fourth article concerns second language acquisition, sequential bimodal bilingualism following a cochlear implant (CI). In the frame, theoretical underpinnings such as mediation and language acquisition were compiled, within a sociocultural frame. This synthesis of results provides important information; in the 12- and 13-month sessions simultaneous-tactile-looking was noted in interchanges between the twins and their mother; mediation of bilingualism was scaffolded by the caregivers with the hearing twin by inserting single vocal words or signs into the language base used at that time, a finding that differs from other reported studies; a third finding is the simultaneousness in which the deaf child’s Swedish Sign Language skill worked as a cultural tool, to build a second and spoken language.

The findings over time revealed actions that included all the family members. Irrespective of the number of modes and varied types of communication with more than one child, mediation included following-in the child’s initiation, intersubjective meaningfulness and encouragement. In accordance with previous research, these factors seem to promote the acquisition of languages. In conclusion, these findings should also prove useful in the more general educational field.